I have smitten you with blasting and mildew: when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased, the palmerworm devoured them: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD.
I hit you with crop disease and blight. Just when your gardens, vineyards, fig trees, and olive groves were thriving, I sent worms to eat everything up. But even after all that, you still didn't come back to me, says the Lord.
God's saying he tried getting their attention through hardship, but they kept ignoring him.
📚 Historical Context
In the 8th century BC, the prophet Amos delivered God's message to the Northern Kingdom of Israel, which was experiencing economic prosperity but widespread moral and social corruption, including idolatry and injustice. God used natural disasters like crop diseases (blasting and mildew) and pests (such as the palmerworm) to strike their agriculture as a form of divine judgment, aiming to awaken the people to their sins and call them to repentance. Despite these repeated warnings, the Israelites persisted in their rebellion, refusing to turn back to God.
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